The Delaware ledger. (Newark, Del.) 1879-19??, 1887-11-05
The Crimson Scarf.
NEW YORK TIMES.

"How old did you say?" asked
the commander-in-chief.
'Nineteen."
Sand the man?"
"a little older"
The commander-in-chief pulled
his cigar at thoughtful intervals.
The war was by twenty-five years a
thing of the past, but as the head of
u great commercial enterprise mil
itary title still chung to him from
out of his war experience, and he
did not dislike it, for some of his
war memories appeared to be his
most cherished mental treasures. So
be debated with his cigar over the
two young people whose sentimental
rashness had brought them into
public notice, and as he debated he
was looking backward over the di-
verse panorama of two decades Of
life, through the rifted smoke clouds
of a great rebellion at little drama
that seemed almost Il dream, but
which to him was, perhaps, the
best remembered incident of all the
five years fight. And when he told
it, half musingly, the listeners did
not wonder. The ways of fate are
very diverse, and it sometimes hap
pens to the least imaginative in the
maddening crowd that a face which
is booked into only for a moment is
meyer forgotten in all the lengths Of
thd years that follow. Perhaps ii
was SO with the commander-in-chief
Perhaps not. In any event, nobody
dared to ask.
On the fall of 1863" he began,
was stationed with a detachment at
Paint Rock, Ala. We were drawing
on the enemy for supplies foraging,
in fict. Our crackers and hard
tack we got from Stevenson, but for
fodder for our horses and anything
to add sumptuousness to the appear
ance of the frying pan we had to
depend on the country. For some
weeks | had sent out the wagon
train to the east, the southeast and
down the valley of the Paint Rock
creek. The only direction left for
investigation was the west, where, at
distance of twenty-one miles was
Huntsville, then the capital Of
northern Alabama, which, up to the
time of the war, had been n wealthy
aristocratic and fashionable city
Well, one pleasant morning 1 sent
the wagons across the creek and
followed them with a guard of TWEEN
ty men. 1t was reported from time
to time that the country ahead oi
us was full of guerriilas, but we saw
no signs of them, and for two months
had no trouble whatever with any
foe.
"Aiter crossing the creek the wag-
ons took road which wound alonl
the foot of a spur at the Blue Ridge
mountains, which rose green, heav
lily wooded and picturesque at oul
backs. We passed several clearing'
and plantations, whose log houses
were filled with hot blooded and ho
tempered southern women, whose
evident desire to flay us with theil
lingernails rather interfered witt
that sweet spirit of hospitality fol
which the South is famous. At q
distance of seven miles 1 halted tht
detachment at a cool but sinister
looking place in the road known tC
all the country round as the Cap
"'The Gap was the entrance to {
pass through one Of the outlying
mountain spurs. 1t was a deeI
hollow, heavily wooded. The denst
growth of towering pines and fir.
grew close to the roadside. Tht
woody spaces were so filled with un
dergrowth and blocked by faller
trees that as you peered into thu
dark recesses of the forest on eithel
side a hostile army might have beer
sheltered there without your being
able to perceive a button. l re
membered the looks of the place
because the first time | saw it made
me rather uneasy, and the last tint
but one that ] saw it l came neal
staying there for good, as did, il
fact, some other poor fellows who
were not so fortunate.
"Well after rest we kept on, anc
a few miles further we came to &
plantation of $50 acres, with a large
and comfortable looking residence
near the roadside The wagons haC
reached there long before us. They
were being rapidly filled from a row
Of well stored corncribs at the bacl
of the house. I had just gotten of